


Cultivation

by gloria_scott



Category: Sherlock (TV)
Genre: 221B Ficlet, Character Study, Gen, Politics, Wordcount: 100-1.000
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-02-28
Updated: 2011-02-28
Packaged: 2017-10-19 23:09:35
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 221
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/206229
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/gloria_scott/pseuds/gloria_scott
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Mycroft muses on current events. And there's a bonsai.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Cultivation

**Author's Note:**

> Originally written for [](http://miya-tenaka.livejournal.com/profile)[**miya_tenaka**](http://miya-tenaka.livejournal.com/)  for her donation via the [](http://help-nz.livejournal.com/profile)[**help_nz**](http://help-nz.livejournal.com/)  auction.

Wildfires, Mycroft mused, contemplating the delicate arboreal sculpture before him, were thoroughly unpredictable beasts. You never knew where a stray firebrand, carried on a stiff wind, might catch. The lightning strike in Egypt hadn’t been altogether unexpected, but the spot-fire now sweeping Libya had been a bit of a surprise. The era of autocratic rule in the region was reaching a swift and decisive end, with little need for outside interference. He preferred organic solutions, anyway.

Mycroft had learned long ago that power was not about control. The tighter you closed your fist, the faster the grains of sand slipped through your fingers – a lesson the unfortunate Mubarak, Colonel Gaddafi and others of their ilk never learned, even as the noose encircled their necks. Power was patience, and an impeccable sense of timing. Events will unfold as they will; the fires will pass. The trick is in selecting the right seeds to plant in the fertile ashes – not too soon, or they’ll be scorched in the smoldering earth, not too late or they’ll be overrun by a riot of weeds. Once rooted, it was just a matter of proper care and feeding, with perhaps a bit of judicious pruning to ensure they kept their proper shape. Mycroft smiled, delicately pinching off an unruly new shoot at the top of the bonsai.


End file.
